BRIE LARSON: The first time I got to play Carol Danvers
was on the set of Avengers.
And it was a big surprise.
They just said, "Brie, if you just go up these stairs, you can go on set."
I had no idea who was there.
I didn't know what scene I was shooting.
And I was thrust in.
Suddenly, the cameras were rolling.
MAN: Whiskey 603 Charlie, take one.
LARSON: I was completely starstruck.
It was an incredible moment.
Our hero... Brie Larson.
(CHEERING)
LARSON: It's just... There's too many things to say
that are the best parts of being Carol Danvers.
(CAPTIVATING MUSIC PLAYING)
Every time I get the opportunity to play her, I grow.
These movies are so big and there's so much you're kind of learning as you go,
it can feel really overwhelming at first.
And now at this point, I feel like I have a sense of ease.
I know how to train.
It's all about just being as prepared as possible,
because once we start filming,
I have no idea what I'm in for.
(HEROIC MUSIC PLAYING)
-(BELL RINGS) -DIRECTOR: Let's roll, please.
MAN: Okay. Rolling? DIRECTOR: Yeah, okay.
Here we go. Ready. And action.
Marvels is happening. It's cool.
Welcome to my happy place.
So, this is Kamala's bedroom.
Fun fact. Iman Vellani's head actually looks like this.
When I first got here, it was like two workouts a day,
training, craziness.
It's been really, really fun.
Kamala's bedroom is just everything a Marvel fan wants.
All the love of the superheroes, it's just all around you,
and I think that's the coolest part of playing a character
that is obsessed with superheroes, like I am.
It's like I'm in my own bedroom, you know?
PARRIS: I love that I get this opportunity
to get to dive deeper into who Monica is in the world of the Marvels.
All right, just some...
I think I'm distracting him.
I could not be happier to be at a place like this
and also the fact that I'm surrounded by so many cool women and powerful people,
you know, working alongside me.
It's been a real blessing, I think.
-(ALL LAUGHING) -And, cut.
It was amazing to work on a film
with three lady heroes, a badass lady villain,
and many, many lady department heads.
Female producer, female director.
It was pretty great.
DIRECTOR: Camera set. And action!
NIA DaCOSTA: The first step coming to direct this movie
was that I told everyone I wanted to do a Marvel movie
for as long as I possibly could. (LAUGHS)
Eventually my agent came to me and said, "Hey, like, Captain Marvel 2."
And then as I got more information, it was Captain Marvel
and Monica Rambeau and Ms. Marvel.
When I heard about Ms. Marvel, I was really excited.
She's one of my favorite characters from the comics.
I read Ms. Marvel when it first came out and I thought it was so fun
and so awesome. And I related to her so much,
'cause like I was a big nerd, from, you know, the tri-state area
who loved superhero stuff and comic stuff,
and she was a nerd who loved that stuff.
The process for me was basically talking to Mary Livanos,
who was my exec on the movie.
Nia and I met during the height of the pandemic via Zoom
and primarily, we just geeked out about comics,
and she pitched an entire Galactus movie.
Right off the bat, it was a case of kindred spirits.
I love that Nia brought her sense of fandom to this film.
She brought so many big ideas to the table.
I think that that exchange of ideas,
that process was how I kind of showed them like,
"Oh, yeah, I can take on this challenge."
I've cut two of Nia's movies.
Candyman and Little Woods.
Little Woods was very much a drama.
Candyman was a little more thriller, horror.
And then this is really fun and exciting and has a lot of humor.
So I do appreciate that genre-wise, we've been able to play around a lot
and do a lot of different things together.
MEGAN McDONNELL: Nia's incredible and she's an incredible director.
But I think something that's huge
is she's also a phenomenal screenwriter.
ELISSA KARASIK: She has such clarity of vision,
who has kind of these overarching goals for the characters
and the script, and gives you a North Star always.
LIVANOS: We've been truly lucky to have incredible writers on this film.
Elissa Karasik came to us from Team Loki.
She's irreverent and hilarious.
So maybe Captain Marvel broke it.
-What? -Yes, your friend, Captain Marvel.
She was walking up and down our living room.
Is Captain Marvel pressuring you in any way?
LIVANOS: And then Megan McDonnell, who I worked with on WandaVision,
is a brilliant world builder and sci-fi enthusiast.
She came up with the idea that our characters are literally entangled.
Our joint exposure to these unsteady jump points
and our susceptibility to electromagnetic energy
-has temporarily entangled world-lines. -Yeah, that, right there.
McDONNELL: For us, entanglement is great thematically
because one, Carol has a team now, whether she likes it or not.
-Oh, my God, we're a team? -Oh, no, we're not a team.
-We're not a team. -(GASPS)
Also, rather than making her less powerful,
our entanglement requires her to be
more thoughtful about how she's using her power.
-KAMALA: (IN DISTANCE) Oh, my God! -Uh-oh!
What makes it so exciting creatively and so difficult for our characters...
DIRECTOR: Action.
...is she can't just light blast something or someone
and has to sit in her feelings.
That's really challenging for Carol.
It's a tough one for Carol because we've realized
that she has sort of decided to work alone.
So there's a little bit of this like, protective,
"No, you stay in the ship, I got this, don't use your powers."
And then in time, they realize that she needs this.
They can't solve this problem unless they figure it out together.
You can stand tall without standing alone.
(ENERGY WHOOSHING)
LIVANOS: Entanglement was a very dynamic idea,
but it was a bit like playing three-card monte the entire film.
DIRECTOR: Hold it. Hold it.
Very good. Here we go.
Three, two, one. Action!
(GRUNTS)
DaCOSTA: Because of the switching,
we got to do probably my favorite fights in the movie,
which is the switch fight.
-DIRECTOR: Action. -(GRUNTING)
DaCOSTA: The first big fight scene between the three heroes,
seeing them switch, not knowing what's going on,
not knowing why they're switching,
but also having to fight in three different locations.
We were first in Kamala's bedroom.
(SCREAMS)
And then she teleported into Dar-Benn's ship,
and she has no idea it's Dar-Benn's ship.
-(GOOSE SNARLS) -(BOTH GRUNTING)
Oh, my God!
That switch fight is super fun.
It has a lot of entanglements.
-DIRECTOR: Action! -(BOTH GRUNTING)
DeMARCO: It was planned really well by everybody involved.
It was incredibly difficult to plot out, which Nia did masterfully
along with our stunt team and all of our department heads.
DaCOSTA: We organized and coordinated that over a long period of time,
from writing it, shot listing, who goes where and when,
and all that stuff, and then going into stuntviz.
It's one of our favorite fights.
Looking at the script beats,
what we need to achieve, how long we've got to shoot it
and, you know, just a process of breaking it all down.
DaCOSTA: It was really fun to put that all together.
For me it was really about being super detailed
and super organized and specific
because once people start switching places,
it just gets really, really crazy.
DeMARCO: We did find it a little in the edit, particularly.
We didn't always know that we'd have to show both sides of every switch.
When two characters are switching places,
do you follow the character to their new location,
or do you stay in the location where you are?
And so there were unlimited number of combinations.
You have to try every single alternative in the editing room
because something that you'd never thought about
could end up being the absolute best part of the movie.
MUNEEBA: Kamala, are you okay?
DIRECTOR: Go and action, Iman.
The process of creating entanglement shots on set
would mean that we would often film each of the hero actors in place.
And know that we would have to stitch them together later.
(ENERGY CRACKLING)
We'd take action up to the point of the switch.
Okay, pause, pause, quickly swap around and then carry on.
It can get confusing at times, so you have to kind of concentrate.
Oh, who switched with who? All right, yep. But fun.
One, two, three, go.
Why would you say "go" if we're going on three?
I'm aware.
What was important about the film, as someone who loves sci-fi,
was how can we make this feel really epic and make space feel real,
but also fun and scary and all that stuff?
(CRACKLING)
(WHOOSHES)
LAURA KARPMAN: In this film, there's a lot of stuff that goes down in space.
And I think whenever you're out in space,
that also has wonderful musical suggestions.
(DRUM BEATING)
(SOUND WHOOSHES)
-Right. That's a good one. -Brilliant. Brilliant.
There's a huge cinematic history of what does space sound like.
That was something that I definitely leaned into exploring.
(SOUND REVERBERATES)
KARPMAN: In space, there is no sound.
You only feel vibrations, which then feel like sound.
Part of that is because sounds in space are 60 octaves below
what the human ear can hear.
When I started researching space, I thought of my friend Evelyn Glennie.
(TRILLING)
(DRUMS BEATING)
Evelyn Glennie is a deaf percussionist. She's world famous.
(MARBLES RATTLING)
-What is this? -(KARPMAN CHUCKLES)
Oh! That's good.
KARPMAN: Not only she's this astonishingly amazing musician
with the most extensive and fabulous collection
of percussion instruments in the world, here's the incredible thing about her.
She hears through her body.
(VIBRATING)
KARPMAN: So Evelyn hears through feeling, which is exactly the kind of essence
we're trying to replicate in the score.
How do you hear through vibrations?
-(SUSPENSEFUL RUMBLING) -KARPMAN: Yep. There we go.
(MOUTHING)
(SINGING) Pa-ra-pa-ra-pa-ra...
And then there's the theme on top.
(INTENSE DRUM MUSIC PLAYING)
(SINGERS VOCALIZING)
KARPMAN: Really early on, I recorded two small choirs,
and those small choirs were based in world music traditions,
so we had a South Asian Carnatic singer.
We had three low basses.
We had a really wide rooted group.
What happens is you have kind of this genderless, otherworldly singing.
(SINGERS VOCALIZING)
(INTENSE MUSIC PLAYING)
KARPMAN: All of that was super experimental,
and I think the reason why it worked well
is because it's sitting in the world of the epic Marvel sound.
(WHOOSHES)
-(KAMALA GASPS) -Hold that thought.
We were lucky to have fully realized characters team up together for this film.
You've got Iman coming from her show.
Teyonah coming from her show.
There's a lot of history and a lot of backstory.
You said you'd be back before I knew it.
When you left...
LARSON: For me playing Carol, I've got one character
that idolizes me and one that sees me as extremely flawed. (LAUGHS)
I didn't know how to explain to a little girl that...
A little girl that hung on your every word.
What's so exciting about putting these three people together as a writer
-is all of the juicy conflict. -(CHUCKLES)
These characters fit together so nicely, and complement each other.
At the core of this movie
is each of their relationships with the idea of being a superhero.
-(BLASTING) -(GASPS)
LARSON: It's really important that we understand
that Captain Marvel really can't be the thing
standing between life and destruction.
It's not always about being Captain Marvel.
Sometimes it's about being Carol Danvers.
Maybe we just send it to voice mail.
KARASIK: Brie and Teyonah and Iman
have just brought their characters to new levels.
Twinsies.
DaCOSTA: It's kind of funny.
All three actresses have lot of qualities with their characters.
Brie got this job however many years ago,
she has so much determination, very similar to Carol Danvers.
And then when she got two other cast members,
she was a leader and made everyone as comfortable as possible.
DIRECTOR: Action.
(GRUNTS)
It's been really exciting, really getting to explore the relationship
between Monica and Carol, what that history is.
What that hurt is, and how they can hopefully heal.
DaCOSTA: Teyonah Parris is such a wonderful Monica.
She gave that character so much depth and spirit.
'Cause she's dealing with the loss of her mother,
Teyonah just brought so much beauty to that.
You guys are catching me at the end of a very long week,
and I just got off the wires with the harness and stuff,
and I hope they got a good shot.
Lots of craziness happened, but I think I gave y'all one good take off. (LAUGHS)
You know, we're living the dream here.
Got three fans.
And Iman Vellani is no exception. She is a huge Marvel nerd.
(LAUGHING) Was that different?
Kamala is Iman. Iman is Kamala.
From day one, I believe that she was born to play this part.
VELLANI: It's the coolest job, I could not ask for anything else.
I would literally do this my entire life.
She is like someone who gets frozen when she meets someone that she admires,
like Kevin Feige or Sam Jackson.
I hid behind our director when Sam walked in the room.
She's so sweet and just fierce.
I have to call her fierce because every time I'm like, "You so cute,"
she's like, "I am fierce and strong."
I'm like, "You're fierce and strong, too. And you are just so cute."
So it's been really, really fun.
DaCOSTA: She really brings this incredible warmth and humor.
And I think those are all the things I loved about Ms. Marvel in the comics.
Her casting is absolutely spot on. It's amazing.
Ammi, we found Nani's other bangle,
and there's this weirdly beautiful, terrifying woman
hurting people with the other one, we have to stop her.
Who is Dar-Benn?
(SCREAMS)
ASHTON: Dar-Benn is the very recent Supremor of the Kree Empire.
She is a massive contradiction.
She's part rage, part hope, part science, part war.
The Skrull have betrayed the Kree.
She's basically been born out of this huge event,
which is Captain Marvel destroying
the Supreme Intelligence of the Kree Empire.
(EXPLODING)
She has a huge vendetta against her.
The Annihilator destroyed the Kree.
KARASIK: I think about what our heroes are up against with Dar-Benn,
I think pure conviction.
And I think one of the most dangerous kinds of villain
is a villain who has nothing left to lose.
(GRUNTS)
(LAUGHING) My God, I...
Zawe just brought a lot of fun to the character.
She had a really good time playing evil.
Zawe as Dar-Benn, I didn't know what to expect.
When I first saw her on set,
I was like, "Oh, my gosh, you look amazing,
"but you also are very scary."
She's quite fierce and intense,
and a little unhinged, not Zawe, but Dar-Benn.
And then, as soon as they call "cut"...
MAN: Cut! Nice, Zawe. Thank you.
...she's like the warmest, fuzziest, sweetest person.
(EXCLAIMS)
So it's really this crazy juxtaposition.
(LAUGHING) I can't cope. I can't cope.
I'm having a lot of fun playing Dar-Benn.
I sometimes look around,
and can't quite believe that I'm in this world.
It's actually really moving.
Because, you know, the MCU's been at the forefront of cinema,
and so it's a very profound experience. It's amazing.
(BOTH PANTING)
-(BOTH LAUGH) -End of film.
DeMARCO: Working for Marvel, we come with a small army to the set.
As support, we are often there with director,
with camera, with grips, feeding back constantly
what will and won't work later.
It's been a great collaborative effort.
We're all part of the same thing. We're creating the same world.
McLAREN: We do have to work, you know, closely together.
So every day there'll be a conversation.
BEN COLLINS: It's epic.
When you've kind of gone through that process
and you see everyone collaborate and get through all the challenges,
and really, nothing's a problem.
It's just all about working out how you get there.
And then, that all has to come together for a specific shoot day.
Nia and Sean and the studio really wanted to embrace as much real as we could.
The sets for this movie were huge, (LAUGHS)
because I really wanted to do 360 sets.
I wanted to be able to shoot as dynamically as possible.
Because the movie was gonna be in space,
I wanted to make sure whatever was real was actually real
so we wouldn't have a bunch of CG in space and CG sets.
We're split over two studios.
So fundamentally, we had eight stages, two back lots, 54 separate sets,
six cranes, five different planets, a space station, five spaceships,
three evacuation pods, a space elevator, and a golf course.
-What? -Yes.
For our little Maria house.
Tremendous, amazing art department, 50-strong construction team,
that's probably 350.
DaCOSTA: One of my favorite sets is Carol's ship.
(SOFTLY) I'm on Captain Marvel's ship.
(WHOOSHES)
VELLANI: All right, MCU cribs tours. Carol's ship.
If you've ever wondered what it's like to be inside someone's brain,
this is it.
We always knew that Carol's ship was kind of like the Airstream of space,
and she needed to take everything with her. It's her home.
She's been living on that ship for 30 years.
It's a cool ship. She can also be comfortable living there.
When you see a lot of films, the spaceships are empty
they're devoid of personality, like an office.
If you're on a spaceship for a long period of time,
how would you live?
We put in some of her past,
things that kept her amused while she was in space,
her favorite books.
We included some self-help books, which Nia thought was hilarious.
All her clothes, her workout kit. We tried to make it very personal.
My favorite thing on this entire ship. They didn't let me put it on.
Mostly because my head's not that small.
AZIS: You'll see behind me, big globes.
These lovely terrariums.
We bought the biospheres thinking they were a certain size.
The company sent these. We thought these biospheres were too big.
We put one on set. It was quite interesting.
We thought she was growing her own food.
We immediately loved it and put more in.
The kitchen. We wanted to really feel like she did some cooking...
I can't touch it.
...rather than just eat space food.
Pickled radish, cucumber and aubergine.
Konjac ball.
AZIS: She's got a coffee maker, special knives.
Really, a normal kitchen, but a space age version of it.
And obviously, quite a lot of cat references.
Her favorite non-human being.
AZIS: Cat books and photographs.
Cat food, much needed.
AZIS: The whole world of Goose.
"Goose Tunes." My heart.
"Soul of Thunder", "Party Mix."
This is on par with Star-Lord cassette tapes by the way.
AZIS: Our graphics team did a wonderful job on the photographs
and on creating the mix tapes.
"Yan Songs."
AZIS: We all put in a lot of detail,
and often it's a sort of lucky dip whether you'll see those things or not.
If you do see them, it's great, and that pays off.
But also for the actors who are on the set,
in between shots they're looking around.
-Ah! She hasn't returned any of these. -It's nice for their character as well.
For this movie,
we went the way of LED volumes.
The idea is to give the spacescapes outside of the ships.
This is so exciting. I get to travel in space.
We actually get to drift past a nebula and jump through a wormhole
in a way I never thought we'd be able to do live on set.
We used LEDs as a replacement for a blue screen.
With the LEDs you get an extension of the environment outside the windows.
(SHRIEKS) It's Nick Fury!
SEAN BOBBITT: Often we're shooting at blue screen studios,
but the images are put in afterwards.
Oh, Lord, it's a blue screen. That means Teyonah has a list of questions.
I don't want to get to the movie theater and be like, "Wait a minute.
"I didn't know I was supposed to be reacting to that."
Nia loves this set because it feels real.
She can respond to things on the wall and the characters can respond to things.
The volume screens are just the greatest thing.
Everyone can actually see
what you're supposed to see and not just a green screen.
So that's always...
SEAN BOBBITT: We have live images moving that the actors can then respond to,
and we get interactive lighting into the spaceship.
All the materials are very much metal and glass.
The reflections and the colors you're seeing through the screen,
it's real and you believe it.
You could slowly see it roll past
over these amazing, nostalgic props that are littered all over the set.
The jump points are the means of space travel.
They're also quite bright wormholes
that give you a view of the world you're traveling to.
To create these jump points,
we worked quite closely with the lighting department.
They set up complementary lighting around the ship for special events
such as the jump points or the Bifrost.
Because, of course, the brightness of the LEDs sometimes was not enough.
(EXCLAIMING)
So as you come through, you get this whole, like, immersive lighting
coming from A to B, all the way through to the back of the ship.
It really makes people's eyes open and go, "This stuff is really great."
COMPUTER: Alpha Centauri system.
BILLY BROOKS: With all this new technology,
there has to be somebody to guide filmmakers.
ILM Virtual Art Department is a group of people
that use real time software to help answer questions basically.
Working with their team has been instrumental in our planning.
They built this ship in 3D and showed us how our content
would play out alongside the scene.
COLLINS: We had 2,400 LED screens.
We could've done with a few more, but there's never enough of anything.
Having these visualizations allowed us to decide, for instance,
to strip some of the panels from the side and put them at the front
to compensate the fact that we were lacking a bit of height.
JACK BROWN: So we had to create the front of the wall
and the two left and right sections
to be able to move up and down on request.
It allowed us to quickly adapt to any of the needs of Sean.
So even if we were shooting a bit too high,
because we don't have an LED ceiling on here,
we were able to simply move the wall up into position within minutes.
It's actually worked remarkably well.
We have great coverage in this ship,
and we're able to see the content out of all of the windows.
(BELL RINGS)
Being able to be in a set where you feel like
you are actually in space has been quite magical.
We all, myself, Sean, Nia, have sat in Carol's chair,
come over a moon, and landed on Aladna.
You actually feel like you're moving through space in the craziest way,
if you're not careful, you might get dizzy.
But it's been magical for all of us.
The first time Kamala went through a jump point,
the actual wonder on her face.
It's like being at an amusement park, especially when we're doing scenes
where they put a gimbal underneath the ship to move the whole thing.
DAVID WATKINS: We actually built this gimbal on the stage.
We've got a hydraulically controlled motion base.
Nia, very early on, she wanted to give the cockpit a real shake,
simulate fast travel...
Change of direction.
All in all, a team of probably 40 guys and girls
from conception through to the operation on stage,
a lot of steel and a lot of hard work.
We've done other gimbals before, but not one of this length.
It was probably the toughest set in terms of the scale of it.
Ending up on a gimbal,
it means the whole set is at 10'6" in the air.
At that height with the amount of special effects,
it had to be a solid steel structure.
Typically, we might make it out of scaffold.
To see it all come together, it's quite special.
The filmmakers feel like they still have this ownership,
which they totally do. And that's the goal for us here at ILM.
We want to help tell these stories.
This set has been amazing. To have this wacky idea nearly a year ago
that we'd be able to fly in space for a few weeks,
and then actually fly in space here, it's been amazing.
(WHOOSHES)
-(SOFT MUSIC PLAYING) -(SINGING) Fair Aladna
It's a peaceful crossroads
ALADNEANS: Our princess is home
-Princess? -(KAMALA GASPS)
-It's a technicality. -(ALADNEANS VOCALIZE)
When I came into the film, they wanted a musical number
in the middle of the movie and I was like, "That's crazy."
Then I got really into the idea.
(UPBEAT MUSIC PLAYING)
You want to live on Aladna. It is stunning. Gorgeous.
Everybody sings.
It was my favorite place to develop because it's really bright and hopeful.
I feel like sci-fi usually is very dark and down and grungy and sad.
But this place is all about joy.
It's been like my dream to do a musical my whole life,
so to get to do it on this scale and this set is just super surreal.
When I first signed up to do a Marvel film,
the last thing I expected to be doing was a musical number.
DaCOSTA: We had this amazing choreographer, Shelley Maxwell,
come in and choreograph the dances.
MAXWELL: We're in the streets of Aladna
and we're doing a welcoming big opening number
with lots of dancers and movement extras.
We started off with 15 dancers doing R&D, and then we graduated to 35,
and now we have over 100 dancers and movement extras in this space.
Movement inspiration came from just jubilation
and the idea of being at a great party.
Damn.
(MONICA GRUNTS TEASINGLY)
LINDSAY: Her princess gown...
What the hell?
LINDSAY: It is a musical number.
She has this terrific song and dance with Prince Yan.
For me, when I read it, first thing was,
it was a Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers number.
(SINGING) Yan
(WHISPERS) I'm feeling so many feelings right now.
-(SINGING) The Captain needs our help -CROWD: Help!
The first film really made me push myself physically,
learning how to be strong.
This was actually the opposite.
This was about learning how to move, learning how to be more fluid...
-What is she doing? -(WHISPERS) Oh, she's respecting the flow.
Be sensual. Things that I did not think were gonna come with playing Carol at all.
I just wanted Carol to have a moment that isn't in a super suit,
that she can be just purely feminine.
But even when she's in the most princess gown,
it's still a sort of Captain Marvel princess gown.
How many chapters of your Captain Marvel fan fiction is this giving you?
KAMALA: So many.
Aladna was just a feat of filmmaking.
It really felt like we were on a lyrical Mediterranean alien planet.
Both the massive scale of it and the attention to detail,
it was really overwhelming and amazing.
VELLANI: It's beautiful. The set is awesome.
These poor extras have been here since 3:00 a.m.
getting their alien makeup done.
I just have so much appreciation for all the work put into it.
DAVID WHITE: How on earth do you approach Aladna?
It was massive in scale.
We've had over maybe 68 life casts of individual characters,
full head and hand life casts, gallons and gallons of silicon.
The one thing about Aladna is that their costumes
are so outrageously cool color-wise, and terrific shapes.
Everything about the makeup is heightened, but it still has to look believable.
So the color tones, you can use a bright pink,
but it's got these beautiful, complementary blues that run through it.
All sorts of tones.
And with the structure of the makeup again,
it's slightly more lavish.
I had, like little wisps, put on the ends of things
and curls, all of these very gregarious kind of shapes.
But they worked beautifully.
LINDSAY: Aladna is a planet of sea, so their everything was very liquid,
very soft, very flowing,
and all of the colors were from under the sea.
So I took a lot of reference from under the sea creatures,
pastels and beautiful coral colors.
Also, there are some fabulous fashion designers
that have that aesthetic in them, namely Iris van Herpen.
So I looked at a lot at her stuff because she is as off-world as you can get.
Because it was off-world,
it's very little you can buy in the shop, so we had to make it all.
We had to dye it all, we had to print it, cut it, everything was done from scratch.
So the people that we have in this room, which is a vast emporium in here,
was full and buzzing with people working really hard.
WAKANA YOSHIHARA: That was the most fun element,
creating the Aladna citizens.
I looked into lots of traditional African art sculptures and tribes
from the early 20th century,
and I found lots of fascinating hairstyles and how they shaped themselves.
HELEN INGHAM: Aladna is the colorful bit,
it's the happy bit in the movie. (CHUCKLES)
It's the girly bit if you're like, "I'm not interested in the fights."
We created costumes for dancers,
so that was slightly different for movement issues.
Lindsay designed tops, bottoms, jackets, coats,
all sorts of things that we incorporated into all the different looks at fitting.
But it's not just Aladna.
We've got other planets on the movie, and that makes up...
Gosh, it must be 1,000 to 1,200 costumes and looks that we've created.
Fun fact, Aladna is actually the leading planet for fashion.
Some of the best costumes I've ever seen. Ever.
-Stunning. -DaCOSTA: It's really fun to add something
that we've never seen before in the MCU.
Just to kind of go full comic book madness with our movie overall.
(SINGING) My Princess from the star...
Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Stop. Please stop. We need to talk.
-He doesn't have to sing? -He's bilingual.
-Yes, Prince Yan. So dreamy. -What a heartthrob.
DaCOSTA: Park Seo-joon I saw in a Korean drama during the pandemic.
Absolutely loved him.
I was like, "I think this guy would be really good."
Park is maybe the most famous person I've ever worked with in my life.
Like, next level, beyond.
(LAUGHS)
We actually went to karaoke one night during filming,
and it was quite a stir. (LAUGHS)
He is amazing. I got to stare into his eyes,
be scene partners with him. He just has so much charisma.
People are gonna be very into Prince Yan.
Yeah, Park was just supernatural. He took to a sword so beautifully.
Liang would show him the choreography once, twice.
-He watched. -Yeah!
Got it. Did it absolutely beautifully and with great energy and grace.
(SCREAMS)
You know, we're stunt people. We love battles and sword play.
We're always in our element.
The more stunt people we've got flying around,
trying to kill each other, the happier we are.
-I have an army. -(ALL EXCLAIM)
ASHTON: My army are made up of the people
that have been teaching these stunts over the past seven months.
The energy that they give for an entire shooting day,
and then go learn more fighting to teach you the next day,
I mean, they're just such uplifting, kind, gentle people.
They do terrible things in the fight,
but they're very kind (CHUCKLES) when we're not on camera.
We tried to bring different, unique styles to the battle with the Aladnians.
We wanted them to move differently to the Kree.
Aladnian people are much more peaceful, much more graceful,
much more fluid in their movement and almost dance-like.
So we wanted to incorporate that in the battle movements
so you could see the difference, how they moved the different weapons
as opposed to the Kree,
more traditional with the guns and the maces.
The battle was great fun.
It's crazy because we're just about at the halfway mark,
and it's the first time we're all together in our super suits.
So, we're dressed up as the Marvels. So that's really exciting.
LINDSAY: For the costumes, the genesis of everything is the comics.
And so we looked at those
and looking at the way the illustrations moved
and how it informs you very much of what the character is,
so you can bring that into something that then is made real.
It's made 3D, it's made out of fabric.
To start the research, the designer and the design team
look at what they want to make it look like,
down to buying the correct fabrics,
testing the fabrics, the dyes, the colors,
the fixtures, the zips, the poppers.
We are doing things old-school, by hand, sculpting by hand.
We're also digitally sculpting, we're 3D printing,
laser cutting where everything is drawn up in the computer.
So we're here to make anything that is prop-side of all the costumes,
whether it is parts of the Marvel super suits,
done in rubber, to space helmets, jewelry, all sorts of things.
HORNSBY: We've had four big workshops, around 170 crew.
It's almost like a big retail park, if you can imagine 300-square-foot units.
You might have between eight and 12 cutters
with their teams working on the costumes,
a team of 20-30 people in the breakdown department,
aging them, dyeing them, gluing them.
A leather department making the leather sculpting,
costume effects department making the armors.
We've got some really talented people
that achieved a lot in a short space of time.
LINDSAY: We all wanted to find a female strength,
to do this without it being sexualized, with just being women.
And I think that was really important to all of us,
that we have these strong characters just going about their business
without any sort of underlying or sidelong sort of sexuality.
It was just women being women and being strong.
Captain Marvel is pretty much invincible, so she doesn't need armor.
She doesn't need to have anything to protect her
'cause she does all that herself.
Where we got to was to just have something that she can work in,
something that's comfortable, that really shows her brand.
Likewise with Monica,
she's a character that's been around, that people have seen.
So it was a development of that.
She is now black and white.
That was where we wanted to go with that one.
Lindsay has been very open to my thoughts and ideas
and what I'm comfortable with, what I haven't been comfortable with.
So I'm really happy with the final look.
Get the boots, get everything. Yes. Thank you.
LINDSAY: And then little Kamala, she has a series.
So we had that costume which we carried on through this.
And then she gets an upgrade.
Could you get us something a little more battle-ready?
DIRECTOR: Action!
You're literally working out when you wear these suits,
because there's, like, so much going on.
But it's fine because I'm basically getting jacked just wearing it.
'Cause it's like a workout.
Imagine wearing a dress made out of resistance bands.
And it's great for my shoulders,
and my trainer says I'm getting stronger from it.
So that's all that matters.
ASHTON: The outfits have been such a pleasure.
They've brought such an element of transformation.
Just running around in leather all day and studs and these space boots,
you know, it's made it feel so real.
Dar-Benn has a brain for science and a body for war.
And so it had to be something that was realistically intimidating
and smart in a way,
because we meet her at this new point in her career as an emperor.
But then she also does a hell of a lot of fighting.
It's one against three, you know.
And so I had to be able to move
and to really be believable as a trained soldier.
So there's a really lovely mixture of emperor and soldier
that I think Lindsay Pugh, our costume designer,
has done brilliantly.
I feel so lucky to have had the hair and makeup team
that I've had on this film.
Wakana Yoshihara, who's done my hair,
and Chantel McDonald who's done my makeup
have been my super heroes
because the transformation has been massive.
(LAUGHS)
It's such a bonkers journey, but I love it.
I love this look so much.
(INTENSE MUSIC PLAYING)
God, the action's great. The action's so good.
(LAUGHING) If I do say so myself.
Oh, wow. This movie has a lot of action.
My mom is texting me, "How's work today?"
And I'm like, "Oh, just fighting some aliens."
That's what I do now.
(GROANS)
I mean, it's playtime.
(SCREAMS)
When we talked about action with Nia in the very beginning,
we want to feel everything we do is real.
-MAN: Pull. -(PARRIS EXCLAIMS)
DaCOSTA: I really just wanted the action to feel grounded enough...
So that when things did go crazy and people were fighting in the sky,
you kind of just believed in everything.
The action's just really special.
One of the first things I talked about with Jo McLaren, our stunt coordinator,
and our second unit director Peng was each character having their own style.
We saw how it developed throughout the film.
Everybody is seeing so many superhero movies.
How we can make something interesting,
fresh.
That's my challenge.
Now we have Ms. Marvel...
Hi.
We have Monica.
They all have different super power.
I can't fly.
MALE KREE: Annihilator!
In this movie, you definitely see the powers
they started with evolve.
Ms. Marvel, she's just gotten her powers.
At first it can be a little bit random.
It was a little more clunky, and not as elegant.
She can create orbs and things and traps Kree inside those.
(WARBLING)
We definitely see that evolve at the end.
She uses the hard light to completely her advantage and for teamwork.
(MS. MARVEL GRUNTING)
And then there's Monica Rambeau who has not used her powers at all,
except for science.
She has to learn how to fight.
(GRUNTS)
She has to know how to fly, all this stuff.
We first see her begin to fly outside the Khans' house.
You gotta fly.
She needs to go and believe that she can go up and help save Kamala.
She gets better and more confident as we go.
For Teyonah, it was really important to track, that she's figuring things out.
So a lot of, "Is this is my first time doing this?"
"Yeah, this is your first time flying."
Or, "It's not your first time doing that, but your first time doing it offensively.
"It's your first time hitting someone with it."
And then with Captain Marvel, she's been doing this for 30 years.
She can be a little bit sloppy because she's not as focused.
Maybe she takes certain things for granted,
and we see how that shifts throughout the film.
Come on.
(EXCLAIMING IN PAIN)
A lot of time, it's Captain Marvel against maybe 20, 30 Kree.
She is the most powerful.
Three, two, one. Action!
We have to show that sense of power.
And we do that with one of the best wire teams...
in the world.
Daryl Andrews, Joe Spilhaus.
Incredibly hardworking team.
LARSON: That's fun.
I can see all the trailers.
This is a very wire-intensive movie.
We have wires pretty much every day.
We see Kree and Dar-Benn getting flung here, there and everywhere.
And when you see those sequences,
all of those moments are meticulously worked out.
We look at the physics, we do bag tests,
we rehearse with lots of pads, lots of thick mats.
And then eventually, when things get dialed in,
then we'll go to soft set, we'll go to thinner mats.
Obviously, we want to protect our stunt performers.
Oh, it's cool. It's Carol.
(ZHANG SPEAKING)
(ALL LAUGHING)
Guys, Peng is the best.
If you've seen Shang-Chi, then you'll know he is an absolute pro.
Fun fact, he used to be Jet Li's stunt double.
-Zawe's my agent. -(LAUGHING)
It was really fun to figure out not just how Ms. Marvel and Captain Marvel
and Monica Rambeau fight,
but also how does the Khan family fight.
How does Mrs. Khan and Mr. Khan,
like, how are they gonna fight against these aliens?
-DIRECTOR: Action. -(EXCLAIMING)
-(SCREAMING) -(ELECTRICITY CRACKLING)
(BOTH GRUNTING)
Obviously, this movie has a lot of visual effects.
Almost every shot, you have a visual effects element,
but we wanted physical to do it, practical to do it.
MAN: Pull the camera away for this one.
ZHANG: Actually, you can see how high the roof is.
This is Carol, jump off, landing on MB-418.
With people that small, we still decided to use a stunt double to drop.
This is about 40 feet to do the real action.
The visual effects will help to build up the speed, build up the environment,
but obviously the stunt is real.
Even when they're flying, we put them on all the different rigs, winches,
ratchets.
I always found it funny when all three, Iman, Teyonah and Brie
would all be on wires.
Brie's sort of like,
-"All right, here we go." -(BELL RINGS)
Teyonah's, "This is new for me."
It was real... It was fun.
It was a lot of fun, but because I'm having to, like, act
and they shoot me up like a cannon,
I was a little scared and shaken up, but it was nice.
And Iman's like, "Yay!" She's in a theme park.
I love roller coasters. So this is, like, my ideal job.
Seeing different reactions to that was funny.
I'm having the time of my life. (CHUCKLES)
I know Teyonah sometimes finds it a little difficult.
And she just sees me spinning around on the tuning fork and everything,
and I'm like having the time of my life.
This is great. (LAUGHING)
I come to work and I just play around.
It's like bungee jumping every day.
Oh, it's great. It's a dream.
DIRECTOR: Action.
This is where all the training actually comes in,
where you're being hung on a wire
by, like, your shoulder point and your thighs.
You just got to hold your core like crazy.
You're working out all day. It's insane.
But this is the superhero stuff.
It's dorky, and as weird as it looks,
when we're all bald and have, like, weird alien spikes on our head
and dots on our face, it's like...
It's weird.
But you still feel like a superhero.
LARSON: The preparation is intense.
For the first film, I trained for nine months,
the second film, probably about four months.
I was able to do a one-arm pull-up and one-arm push-ups. Ten on both arms.
And it's all about just getting my body completely limber and strong
and ready for whatever.
PARRIS: When I first got here,
I had a couple of weeks with Maria, my stunt double,
just really trying to learn some basics.
They've just been so helpful, so patient, so encouraging.
Also just really badass, as you can see.
So I'm like, "I'm gonna tap you in. You go. You do it.
"Please make me look great. I'll do what I can." It's been wonderful.
ASHTON: I can't talk about the stunt team without crying,
so I'm going to try this one time.
(ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYING)
I had no idea how key the stunt team is to a film like this.
That might sound naive, but they are the beating heart.
Like in a musical, when you sing, that's your level of communication.
Combat is the communication of these films.
When I first went into my stunt session,
I worried about my level of strength and coordination.
But I needn't have worried because the stunt team are the kindest,
most hardworking people you could meet.
I've just been talking about all you guys.
LISTER: Oh, no. It's not true. I promise.
ASHTON: These are the amazing team that I've been talking about.
Andy Lister, Liang, Snow, Rashid Phoenix.
That's Maria and Jess and Snow.
My stunt double's one of the greatest people ever. (CHUCKLES)
-As you can see, Rashid is a male. -(LAUGHS)
Yes, so Zawe is a lovely, lovely tall lady.
We're a little bit short on 5'11" ladies over here in the UK.
So come on, girls, get training for the stunt register.
He's had to throw himself into wearing a lot of padding in all the right places.
He's a tall, slender gentleman with legs most women would absolutely kill for.
Zawe had that situation before,
and was more than happy and absolutely loves Rash.
And then we have the lovely Chloe who is a beautiful mover as well,
but can't be in two places at once.
He makes me look so good. And you wear the hair well.
Thank you. (LAUGHS)
(CHUCKLING) Sometimes it's styled a bit better than mine.
-I get annoyed about that. -Don't talk about that.
The wonderful thing about working in visual effects for Marvel Studios,
they allow us to capture all of the reference we would ever need every time.
Are there cats? (GASPS)
(MEOWS)
-Nia really cared about cats. -(MEOWS)
DeMARCO: We brought real cats into pretty much every scene.
DaCOSTA: It was so cute.
Even the grumpiest crew members would be like, "Where are the cats?"
DeMARCO: The interesting challenge with recreating a house cat
is that many, many people have house cats,
and they know what they look like.
You might have one that sleeps next to you.
We wanted to be as accurate as possible.
So we actually did a super complicated cat scan... (IMITATES DRUM ROLL)
...to create the best possible CG cat.
JO VAUGHN: We have two Geese on this.
This is Nemo, who is one of them. The lead cat is called Tango.
We have two because they're both good at very different things.
Nemo, he's a bit more of a stunt cat.
He likes to do all the running, the jumping.
Tango is much steadier.
He does all of the sitting, staying, the eyelines, the quirky looks.
They're a good team.
(BELL RINGS)
Tango and Nemo, they're really just a nightmare.
-(BOTH LAUGHING) -I'm kidding.
They're just the biggest divas on this set.
At one point, to Nia I was like, "It's me or them."
-And Nia made her choice. (LAUGHS) -KARASIK: Yeah.
And that was the last day I worked on The Marvels.
DIRECTOR: Action.
(WOMAN LAUGHS)
DaCOSTA: I'll give these back so people think I'm actually working.
LIVANOS: Kitten days were exhilarating, truly the best thing ever.
Also, incredibly stressful.
They were tiny and sweet and terrifyingly unpredictable.
(PURRS)
LIVANOS: The entire crew became cat moms.
Everyone was liable to herd cats
if ever they ran off in the wrong direction.
So, we're literally herding cats?
It basically became the scene of the movie that we were shooting.
DeMARCO: Just like with Goose, we often would film our kittens as a reference.
But kittens aren't as well-trained as our hero Goose was.
So almost every kitten in the movie is a CG kitten.
(MEOWS)
But there are a handful of shots where they were too cute to pass up,
and I'll let you decide which ones they were.
LARSON: When your director's giving you notes
and like everyone's got a kitten, that's a great day.
When you're on an 85-day shoot,
you should have some days where kittens are there.
I do like cats.
(CAPTIVATING MUSIC PLAYING)
KARASIK: The gift and challenge of this movie is that you're not only answering
to the widening MCU and multiple backstories,
but you're doing that times three.
Something that I've always loved about MCU as a fan
is how it blends so many genres at once.
And oftentimes the tone of a movie will follow from the character.
When you have three characters like this,
it actually gives you a lot to play with.
KARPMAN: We're here today at Abbey Road Studios
recording the score for The Marvels.
(PLAYING VIOLIN)
KARPMAN: I feel privileged beyond belief to be here.
It sounds amazing. The room is amazing. The musicians are amazing.
To have this kind of orchestra,
and this combination of 90 players out there who are all phenomenal,
to be able to express my musical thoughts is a privilege.
Laura Karpman came to us from What If...?,
taking many different heroes from all across the Marvel universe
and finding each of their own signature sounds and themes
and bringing them together.
What If...? was a great place to train for doing Ms. Marvel and The Marvels.
You've got our three protagonists, all who've appeared in other shows, right?
Ms. Marvel, WandaVision,
and, of course, Captain Marvel.
So we had to have a new superhero theme that was the theme for the three of them.
Like, a team theme.
(ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYING)
Laura did an amazing job coming up with a theme
that we all hum around the office.
So good. (LAUGHS)
Sometimes I'll turn it on just to dance to it (LAUGHING) in my office.
KARPMAN: I think it's a fabulous theme.
Am I allowed to say that? I think it's great.
Twelve French horns, Marvel theme, upbeat, you know, super fun.
(ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYING)
Also, quite noteworthy is our theme for Dar-Benn.
For her sound, I used seven flutes, including a contrabass flute.
So, it's this wicked, low, slithery sound.
That, to me, is Dar-Benn.
The flute theme you'll hear, there's bit of jazz in there, I gotta say.
'Cause Dar-Benn's kind of jazzy in her own way, right?
She's got a vibe.
She's got an attitude which struck me as smoky.
Nia had a lot of input.
She came to every session. She was really there. She participated.
-See all the strings doing that. -DaCOSTA: Mmm-hmm.
KARPMAN: We did some really cool improvisations with the orchestra as well.
I call it the wall of sound, where I took all of the elements of Dar-Benn's theme
and cued everyone in the orchestra to play them simultaneously.
So what it is, is it's structured chaos.
She was super hip to that,
and loved all that kind of experimentation.
(FLUTE MUSIC PLAYING)
(INTENSE MUSIC PLAYING)
(MUSIC STOPS)
Absolutely perfect.
Thank you.
KARPMAN: The week that we spent at Abbey Road was
really one of the best weeks of my life.
There was a sense of camaraderie. We had all-female first chair players,
and I insisted on a diverse orchestra.
So we saw a lot of different faces in the orchestra, so that was great.
I feel so fortunate to be appreciated in this world because I love it so much.
MAN: Three, two, one...
(LAUGHING) A bit too quickly. Sorry.
There were so many fun and memorable things from set.
-(ALL CHEERING) -It was a really fun shoot
with so many moments that were really memorable.
-Oh, my God! -(WOMEN SCREAMING)
Kevin Feige, Samuel Jackson, Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris,
just all these amazing people singing me Happy Birthday.
(ALL CHEERING)
That moment replays in my head over and over again.
Cake was good, too.
This is not us going to, like, work and then we clock out. This is our life.
So there was just this childlike play.
We're able to rib each other because we have so much love for one another.
Some really funny things that happened will not sound funny at all,
'cause it's like, "Someone went up on a wire weird."
And we could not stop laughing for the longest time.
This is my fault.
It was so much fun. It was so great.
I had the most amazing crew...
(COOING)
...and every day was something new.
This show, it's a bit like a party. (CHUCKLES)
We all just had each other basically.
Now, guys, just one more from me before I hand over to Nia.
I want to say to Nia from all of us,
I think, will join me in saying, the most fantastic leader we could have had
for the last 17 weeks and all the prep,
and the best of luck to her.
(ALL CHEERING)
Thank you so, so, so, so much.
This job absolutely terrified me when I got it last summer.
You guys have made it the most enjoyable, exciting, awesome experience I've had.
-I love you all. Thank you. Thank you. -(ALL APPLAUDING)
LIVANOS: The set was a really wonderful place to be.
The crew really became a family.
It's truly been a passion project for each and every one of us.
Nia, our director, and Mary, our producer, fostered the best on-set environment.
It was really fulfilling to work with such an integrated collaborative group.
LIVANOS: Amazing, guys.
The most rewarding part of this whole production
is the collaboration with the cast, with the crew.
Thank you so much.
It is an extraordinary privilege to work with such talented people.
LARSON: Hair, makeup, wardrobe, choreography, everything.
It went to the next level.
VELLANI: This movie's gonna inspire a lot of people, and I'm very excited.
I think it's very different than everything we have in the MCU so far,
and, you know, it's so rare where you get to see
this many badass people of color and women at the forefront
of a movie on a scale this huge.
(DEBRIS CRUMBLING)
KARASIK: This movie is a tone-setter, I think, for the MCU going forward,
in terms of how it does bring
disparate characters together across space and time,
how that can really escalate or upgrade the storytelling.
There's more of a cosmic community, whether or not the characters know that.
"What you seek is seeking you."
Okay.
(SIGHS) Today is my wrap day.
Very bittersweet about it.
Haven't really processed anything.
This job has been so incredibly wonderful.
-(ALL CLAPPING) -(PERSON WHISTLES)
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you so much. Thank you for being here.
Thank you for being away from your families and your friends and your pets
and your loved ones.
Thank you for dedicating so much time to this.
I just cherish all of you so much.
(ALL CHEERING AND CLAPPING)
(PERSON WHISTLES)
(SOFTLY) Thank you so much.
Where this film ends,
there's a big question mark there of what that means for Carol.
There's a lot in her heart that is settled.
There's a lot in my heart that feels settled.
Every other character, when it's over, I'm like, "Get it off."
And this is the one that I've been like,
"I think I'm gonna keep this on a little bit longer."
And I've seen how this star, this symbol has meant so much to so many people.
I would love to carry on that tradition of being able to be part of it.
And also I understand that it's not all mine, you know?
Anybody can take that mantle. And I also feel at peace with the fact
that we've got this new school coming in.
I was born for this.
LARSON: There's new faces, new superheroes coming in,
and so I don't know where Carol's place is.
And I feel like I can rest in the fact that, like,
we've got some amazing people
that are going to help take care of this universe.
Higher, further, faster.
(MUSIC BUILDS)
(WHOOSHES)
(HEROIC MUSIC PLAYING)